"Well, they were merry and joyful, one may think, and when the lad was bidden down to dinner, and they had dined, the princess was as lively as a lark.
"'No doubt you have got what I thought of?' said she.
"'Aye; aye; I have it,' said the lad, and he tore it out from under his coat, and threw it down on the board with such a thump that the board, trestles and all, was upset. As for the princess, she was as though she had been dead and buried; but she could not say that this was not what she was thinking of, and so now he was to have her to wife as she had given her word. So they made a bridal feast, and there was drinking and gladness all over the kingdom.
"But the companion took the lad on one side, and told him that he might just shut his eyes and sham sleep on the bridal night; but if he held his life dear, and would listen to him, he wouldn't let a wink come over them till he had stripped her of her troll-skin, which had been thrown over her, but he must flog it off her with a rod made of nine new birch twigs, and he must tear it off her in three tubs of milk: first he was to scrub her in a tub of year-old whey, and then he was to scour her in the tub of buttermilk, and lastly, he was to rub her in a tub of new milk. The birch twigs lay under the bed, and the tubs he had set in the corner of the room. Everything was ready to his hand. Yes; the lad gave his word to do as he was bid and to listen to him. So when they got into the bridal bed at even, the lad shammed as though he had given himself up to sleep. Then the princess raised herself up on her elbow and looked at him to see if he slept, and tickled him under the nose; but the lad slept on still. Then she tugged his hair and his beard; but he lay like a log, as she thought. After that she drew out a big butcher's knife from under the bolster, and was just going to hack off his head; but the lad jumped up, dashed the knife out of her hand, and caught her by the hair. Then he flogged her with the birchrods, and wore them out upon her till there was not a twig left. When that was over he tumbled her into the tub of whey, and then he got to see what sort of beast she was: she was black as a raven all over her body; but when he scrubbed her well in the whey, and scoured her with buttermilk, and rubbed her well in new milk, her troll-skin dropped off her, and she was fair and lovely and gentle; so lovely she had never looked before.
"Next day the companion said they must set off home. Yes; the lad was ready enough, and the princess too, for her dower had been long waiting. In the night the companion fetched to the king's grange all the gold and silver and precious things which the Troll had left behind him in the Fell, and when they were ready to start in the morning the whole grange was so full of silver, and gold, and jewels, there was no walking without treading on them. That dower was worth more than all the king's land and realm, and they were at their wits' end to know how to carry it with them. But the companion knew a way out of every strait. The Troll left behind him six billygoats, who could all fly through the air. Those he so laded with silver and gold that they were forced to walk along the ground, and had no strength to mount aloft and fly, and what the billygoats could not carry had to stay behind in the king's grange. So they travelled far, and farther than far, but at last the billygoats got so footsore and tired they could not go another step. The lad and the princess knew not what to do; but when the companion saw they could not get on, he took the whole dower on his back, and the billygoats a-top of it, and bore it all so far on that there was only half a mile left to the lad's home.
"Then the companion said: 'Now we must part. I can't stay with you any longer.'
"But the lad would not part from him, he would not lose him for much or little. Well, he went with them a quarter of a mile more; but farther he could not go and when the lad begged and prayed him to go home and stay with him altogether, or at least as long as they had drunk his home-coming ale in his father's house, the companion said, 'No. That could not be. Now he must part, for he heard heaven's bells ringing for him.' He was the vintner who had stood in the block of ice outside the church door, whom all spat upon; and he had been his companion and helped him because he had given all he had to get him peace and rest in Christian earth.
"'I had leave,' he said, 'to follow you a year, and now the year is out.'
"When he was gone the lad laid together all his wealth in a safe place, and went home without any baggage. Then they drank his home-coming ale, till the news spread far and wide, over seven kingdoms, and when they had got to the end of the feast, they had carting and carrying all the winter both with the billygoats and the twelve horses which his father had before they got all that gold and silver safely carted home."